Sunday, August 14, 2011

Garlic lovers, did you miss Gilroy Garlic Fest this year? If you did, you can still go a little garlic crazy at Chaya Venice this August, where they're offering special garlic dishes during their month-long Garlic Fair.

They have about ten garlic dishes, most of them not overly garlicky (except for the rib eye steak with 40-clove garlic sauce, or so our server told us. Mmm 40 garlic cloves ...)

After an amuse bouche of beets with orange and arugula, we started our garlic feast with Heirloom Tomato with Garlic Ice Cream and Fourme d’Ambert cheese ($13)

Overall good, but the heirloom tomatoes were overshadowed somewhat by the smaller, sweeter tomatoes. I liked the garlic ice cream with the tomatoes, but the possibly even stinkier blue cheese masks the garlic a bit.

The "sukiyaki" was actually served in a tagine and might be the least garlicky of all (despite the half bulb of garlic in the tagine). I'm not sure why it was called sukiyaki but nevertheless, we both really liked this dish, especially the tender short ribs with the slightly sweet sticky rice.

For dessert, they also have a garlic crème brûlée. Unfortunately I couldn't convince my dining companion to try it, so we went with their regular desserts ($9 each).